REINHARDSWALD – DER WALD BLEIBT STEHEN

Newspaper reports we came across in the summer of 2018, telling us that a legendary and unique forest landscape in northern Hesse—the Reinhardswald—was under threat, drew our attention to a complex SCANDAL OF OUR TIME.

In the winter of 2018/19, we set out for the forest.

Ancient, elemental tree beings, some of them up to 800 years old, welcomed us and called upon us to create portraits worthy of them. The enchanted forest of the Brothers Grimm received us.

Above the core forest area, within the dense, continuous woodland along the ridge running parallel to the course of the River Weser, a company intended to erect 20 wind turbines directly in the forest. At 250 metres high, they were planned to become some of the largest wind turbines in Germany.

In times of climate crisis, wind power is undoubtedly an important component of the energy transition.

But it does not belong in forests.

There are entirely different, decentralised forms of wind-energy generation that can be 20 to 50 times more effective.

The wind turbines we have become so familiar with are once again the product of a symbiosis between political and corporate interests, in which alternative forms of energy generation are prevented from flourishing simply because of centralised, monopolistic interests.

And so we accept it all and tell ourselves that this is simply how things have to be.

No—it doesn’t have to be that way!

People, inform yourselves—and you will be astonished, and at the same time angry …

Throughout 2019, in four stages, we created 40 paintings there in the forest, under extremely demanding climatic conditions—particularly during the summer of extreme heat—and considerable logistical difficulties.

We portrayed the trees and the surreal reality of the first clearances.

During one of our painting interventions on the forest ridge, immediately adjacent to the site where one of these giant wind turbines was planned, we found ourselves in the middle of a BATTLEFIELD OF TREES.

Tree-clearing machines were cutting down the forest all around us.

A hellish noise in the forest … unbearable—indecent …

We bore witness.

The paintings are that testimony.

They carry the memory of these unbearable circumstances, but also the grace and dignity of the ancient trees, into the minds of people who were not there in the forest.

Perhaps, when you see the paintings, you will find your way into the forest yourself.

On a sunny weekend in September 2019, we installed the paintings along the ridge in the forest and invited people to come and see them there:

an art exhibition in the forest.